In the long view of the critical process, it could be said that the
rhetoric of failure that Mr. Holmes is puzzled by isn't really about Mark
Twain and his work.  It's about the entire field of criticism, its
fashions and its self-image.  The harsher views of Twain must be seen as
an obligatory part of the process by which we continue to address and
redefine the lives and work of important people.  The most cynical
observers would say, perhaps with some justification, that much of this
rhetoric is the result of the insatiable appetites of the Ph.d. mill, but
in fact it's just part of the nature of twentieth-century thought.
Brooks's "The Ordeal of Mark Twain" (1920) exemplifies an apparently
irresistible impulse (in both professional criticism and in academics)
that thrives on these remarkably dismissive pronouncements about giant
figures in every field of endeavor.

It's kind of embarrassing, really, for those of us who think we've
developed some expertise about a given subject, to realize that a sizable
portion of whatever intellectual "subculture" we're a part of thrives on
this sort of reflexive giant-killing.  Undeniably epochal figures as
diverse as Ernest Hemingway, Mickey Mantle, and Abraham Lincoln have been
subjected to this treatment, their entire lives and works recast as
hopeless and nearly pointless tragedies.  The people who write this stuff
often do a splendid job of identifying genuine frailties and
disappointments that haunted the endeavors of their monumental subjects,
but then they elevate that darker side of the story to a disproportionate
degree.  Just as people with other rhetorical stances might view those
negatives as handy literary devices by which to demonstrate their hero's
great capacity to overcome personal obstacles, people with the "life is
failure" perspective turn it all the other way.  Reading these treatments,
you wouldn't know that Hemingway reshaped modern prose, that Mantle was
among the most dreaded sluggers in history, or that Lincoln did infinitely
more important things than either of them.  I read a biography of Mantle a
few years ago that made it sound like it was a miracle he even made it to
the major leagues.

I'm not sure what brings on this bizarre loss of perspective, but it's
still the most fashionable approach for a large segment of the critical
culture.  I do wonder if it attracts a good many fundamentally tormented
souls to the critical enterprise just because it provides them with a
wholesome outlet for their tendencies.  But as the previous commentators
have made clear, all we can do is try to keep these strange critical
treatments in perspective and appreciate them for their more lucid
insights into human inadequacies.

And if we have a free moment after doing that, we can wonder what in the
world ever possessed a guy like Brooks, who was apparently born without
even the slightest trace of a sense of humor, to imagine that he had any
business evaluating Mark Twain in the first place.

Paul Schullery
Bozeman, MT

>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Scott Holmes <[log in to unmask]>
> To: TWAIN-L <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Fri, Apr 20, 2012 6:44 pm
> Subject: Failures in the works of Mark Twain
>
>
> I've been aware for some time now that there has been dissatisfaction
> with the concluding portion of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but not
> until this last year have I become aware of what seems to be a sense of
> failure in much of his work. =20
>
> A few weeks back I mentioned I was reading Cox's Mark Twain The Fate of
> Humor and I was surprised at the thought that Connecticut Yankee and/or
> The Prince and the Pauper were failures.  Upon finishing this book it
> seems to me that Cox felt most of Twains work were failures.  And this
> surprised me greatly especially sense he seems to be so well informed on
> the topic. =20
>
> I started today on Lawrence Howe's Mark Twain and the Novel.  This
> appears to argue that the failures were not Twain's but are structural.
> Nevertheless, the idea that there are failures or faults in these works
> surprises me.  In fact it disturbs me.  I suppose this is because I am
> not a literary critic  or even academically trained in English (my
> degrees are in Geography).  In my mind, a book, in this case a novel, is
> a failure only if it fails to interest the reader and/or proves to be
> unreadable.  This is not the case with any of Twain's works in my
> experience.=20
>
> On further searching for why this sense of failure exists I came upon a
> review of Cox's book by Kristin Brown.  It would seem that Mark Twain IS
> a Humorist and must write humorous material, otherwise "Twain had
> attempted to suppress his genius".  This is the crux of my problem with
> the idea that there are failures.
>
> This strikes me very much like the argument that Miles Davis was a
> failure after he progressed beyond Bebop.  An artist is not allowed to
> venture away from their established genre.  Humor might have been his
> "strongest suit" but by no means need it be his only suit.
>
> Thoughts?
>